The price of gasoline and how much we consume are common topics of conversation around the globe and particularly in Canada. We thought it was time for an oil company to contribute to the discussion. Welcome to Petro-Canada’s PumpTalk blog.

April 18, 2013

Mileage Tracking Apps for Tax Season

Photo: iStockphoto

We've talked about fuel tracking apps and general driving apps on PumpTalk but with tax season upon us, we thought we'd feature three more handy smartphone apps that track your mileage for business purposes.

You know…for those of us who are tired of using the backs of Petro-Canada receipts and a pen to keep track of our business miles.

One of the top rated mileage-tracking apps on both iOS and Android is Triplog GPS Mileage Tracker. It's free to download initially, but has some features that you have to pay in order to upgrade (cloud storage, generating reports, etc.) It tracks your mileage using GPS and its unique "auto-start" feature makes it easy to get started tracking as soon as you start driving.

This TripLog demo gives you an idea of how the TripLog app works for a variety of business people:

Trip Cubby (iOS only), is another top-rated choice for mileage trackers out there. There's an ad-supported version that's free, or you can pay $2.99 and spring for the ad-free version. Trip Cubby features an intuitive interface and easy-to-use tracking options. You can create custom tags to group trips into different categories - and you can customize reimbursement rates for your mileage as well.

MileBug ($2.99, iOS and Android) is also a popular option. Like the other apps, it tracks the miles you drive for business, charity and medical reasons - plus, Milebug saves frequent trips so you save time in tracking miles you trek on a daily or weekly basis. Its data back-up functionality helps to ensure that you don't lose the miles you've already tracked.

Check out this demo video for MileBug on Android to get an idea of how the app works.

All three of these apps are geared towards US residents, but currencies and mileage can be converted to Canadian dollars and kilometres, so they're still useful options for your business tax purposes.

Of course, as with any app, your mileage with these three may vary. Be sure to check out these tax tips for more information on the Canada Revenue Agency's business mileage reporting requirements.

Do you have a favourite app to track your mileage for business? Let us know in the comments.

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